Why not just be honest for a change? You are NOT "inviting" anyone to answer the questions you pose - seeing as they HAVE been answered satisfactorily, repeatedly and Biblically - it seems you only want the answers to be your own presupposed answers, aren't you? You pose these SAME questions across multiple threads whenever you start losing an argument about any other subject. Like Obama and his "race card", you pull this one out as a last resort in an attempt to stop all disagreements and present yourself and your chosen religion as THE authority. Every time you do this, you only make this more apparent than the last time you flipped the card out. You even made your SCREEN NAME the same as your "trump" card!
Like I asked earlier, why not just be honest? I believe you expect whatever you claim is your interpretation of what your religion says MUST be the truth and only the truth and anyone who attempts to prove something else is cast off as ignorant. Don't be surprised the next time you pull the same canard, that you are ignored completely - I know I will. You will only have yourself to blame.
Amen. There is a reason why such men as him were once forbidden to engage in such debates. Their means of argumentation as well as their arguments are an argument against the overall premise of their church.
be honest for a change? i think what is upsetting to some folks is my focusing like a laser beam on the historical, orthodox Faith that is supported by the Scriptures and Apostolic Tradition, as opposed to the 16th century tradition of men. so yes, when the answers to my questions do not line up with what the Scriptures teach and Christians ( my religion as you say ) have believed from Peter to Paul to Ignatius to Justin Martyr to Irenaeus to Hippolytus to Athanasius to Jerome to Basil to Augustine to Gregory to Thomas to all the Church Councils all the way to today, i am going to contend for the faith once delivered.
i know it makes people who think they are following Christ, but who teach a different Gospel uncomfortable. i get it.
i believe if one truly is born again and is a believer in Jesus Christ, than they will be obedient to Christ. baptism is what makes one a Christian, the first act of obedience for a Christian is OBEDIENCE. so when Jesus prays that his followers be One in John 17, so the world will know the Father sent Jesus, WHAT DOES THIS MEAN TO A CHRISTIAN? when Paul instructed the Corinthians not to have any dissension, WHAT DOES THIS MEAN TO A CHRISTIAN? when Paul instructed the Ephesians that we should all attain to the unity of the faith, WHAT DOES THIS MEAN TO A CHRISTIAN?
well, to some it apparently means they feel free to read the Scriptures and then decide what THEY FEEL the Scriptures mean, supposedly led by the Holy Spirit, even if the doctrine they FEEL is 100% opposed to historical, orthodox Christianity and no one believed it for 1,500 years. THIS WAY OF THINKING IS SO FAR REMOVED FROM THE MIND OF CHRIST AND HAS DONE TREMENDOUS DAMAGE TO MILLIONS OF SOULS OVER THE PAST CENTURIES.
i can speak from personal experience to the many Jehovah Witnesses and Mormons that i have invited into my home over the years and seeing how they have bought into the lie that the Church went apostate in the 2nd or 3rd century and they are “restoring” the true church. i only pray that my sharing the truth with these lost souls was used by the Holy Spirit to show them that the true Church has been here for 2,000 years, protected by the Holy Spirit and it will be here until the end of the age.
how is the unity Jesus prayed for and Paul commanded possible if everyone feels free to decide doctrine on their own and ignore Hebrews 13:17 “ obey your leaders and SUBMIT TO THEM; for they are keeping watch over your souls as men who will have to give an account”
it is the Holy Spirit who raises up leaders in the Church and protects the Church. when we become a Christian, the Church exists already, we are commanded to be ONE WITH THE CHURCH AND HAVE NO DISSENSION.
the question we all must ask is “ are we obedient to Christ or do we follow our own pride?”
by their fruits you will know them.
RC teachings are not dependent upon the weight of Scriptural warrant, but that they at least do not contradict it, but which may be according to her self-proclaimed infallible judgment, while Catholics disagree about what Rome as well as Tradition, history and Scripture teaches, and which the poster himself manifests.
And the fruits we will know them by include or (depending on her ability or loss thereof) torturing and cruelly suppressing and even killing theological dissents, or treating moral deviants as members in life and in death. As Teddy K evidences just for one.
But blind devotion results in basically dismissing such inconvenient truths, and more arguments by assertion.
“A man that is an heretick after the first and second admonition reject; Knowing that he that is such is subverted, and sinneth, being condemned of himself. “ (Titus 3:10-11)